We were getting ready to go and meet some friends for a cup of coffee, and Smallsteps had decided her new name is going to be Ella. This might change several times during a day of course, but that is the way of children. But, since she chose the name (a common Finnish girl's name), I said I knew a very old song by an Ella and played it, asking if she recognized it. She did immediately, as it was "Summertime" by Ella Fitzgerald. She then said,
It is amazing that people still listen to songs from someone who died so long ago.
Yes it is. It is incredible.
While we are a species of storytellers and have been recording our stories for thousands of years, it has really only been in the last few hundred years that the cost has come down so much, that normal people have been able to record thoughts, words and voices and know (with some accuracy) who has created what and when. This is obviously at an all time high now, where there are multiple globally accessible platforms created and populated entirely by what we choose to share, whether it is useful or not.
But, thinking back to what Smallsteps said about how amazing it is to be able to listen to the songs of past greats, or read their books and see their creations - it is also worth recognizing that we don't listen to everything that was created or recorded. The vast majority of will barely be consumed whilst the creator lived and likely never after they have passed. But, for the content that is true quality, it will live on and on.
Summertime itself isn't an Ella Fitzgerald song, it was written by George Gershwin in the 30s and the first popular cover was sung by Billie Holiday, twenty years prior to the link above. Which hints at what it takes for something to endure through time, after death and beyond - quality. That quality in terms of art, music or writing might be a type of timelessness, but what makes it timeless?
Summertime for example is a lullaby, which is why I have been singing it to Smallsteps since the first night we brought her home. And until AIs replace us, parents are likely to be singing lullabies to their kids for some time to come, giving them "demand" in culture. Then of course, there are the other aspects, where like a little black drees, it is always in fashion - even if it there is still a time and a place to wear it. And there is always a time and place, somewhere.
However, who sits down and watches the newscast from six months ago? The only reason that news from the past comes up, is when it is relevant to news from today, often juxtaposed for humor as to how far we have come in that time - like the Today Show discussing the internet in 1994. At some point, I believe we will be looking back at all the ridiculous stories surrounding crypto in much the same way.
Yet, when it comes to lasting content, what is going to last from today? And when I say "last", I don't mean just in storage of some kind, but actually consumed. For example, I don't expect a lot of my content to have lasting value to a large scale audience in ten years from now, but I do believe that in ten or so years ago, there will be at last one person who might be interested enough to dive into the blockchain and discover what I had to say -
Smallsteps.
Isn't it amazing that he will hear my thoughts from a decade earlier?
Just think about the hundreds of thousands of war orphans from World War 2 who never knew their father, perhaps not even having a photo of them. If a similar thing happened today, children would potentially have a massive amount of material to sift through, but once they got past the memes and dick pics, what would they find?
What have we created that is enduring?
And this is perhaps one of the worst things about the "You'll own nothing and be happy" statements, because what they are essentially saying is that we will have nothing of ourselves to pass on to our children. There will be no legacy of any kind. We will live our lives, die, and that is that. At least from a human existence standpoint, it is counter to everything that has got us here so far, our stories.
When we don't own anything, our lives become far more meaningless and detached, as while we might be "free" to do as we please, we don't have any reason to do much of anything at all. We are a species of convenience and whilst it might sound like fun to do whatever we want, the reality is that most of us given the chance, don't do much of anything at all. However, when we have ownership and subsequent responsibility, we tend to do a lot more and, we tend to look to create something of value that we can pass onto others, whether it be in the form of an investment portfolio, or a collection of paintings.
If we will own nothing and be happy, why paint for a reward? And if we aren't getting rewarded for our art, will we have the drive to create it, just to give it away freely, as if our time, effort and skill is valueless?
Your intuition might be saying, "the enjoyment of others is payment enough" but that is likely bullshit. And, even if it isn't complete bullshit, it also indicates that at a human level, we want to get the sense that our creation is valuable in other people's eyes. Our creation - making it "owned".
And at a species level, if we are going to survive the future for any longer amount of time, we are going to have to solve problems with solutions that take a large amount of people to develop and, even more to support. This means that there has to be incentive to create in a coordinated direction, which is exactly what an economy does through the laws of supply and demand. In a world of unnatural demand however, the laws will still dictate a supply, even if it doesn't speak to solving the actual problems at hand.
On the shoulders of giants.
Yes, we are all developing on the back of other people's developments, but this doesn't mean that new isn't get created. However, if there is no incentive to improve upon the past, it is unlikely improvements will be made. And, one of the ways to incentivize development is by creating mechanisms that allow us to pass our value along to the next generation - the stories of our lives.
When I pass, my daughter will hopefully inherit some kind of financial value that will give her a strong enough safety net to be able to explore what her values are. But also, she will get access to a plethora of me through millions of words and across multiple topics. What she does with it all is up to her, but because at least the words portion of this has a public front, perhaps someone else will chance upon something, be inspired by something else and use it to improve their own lives, or that of others.
One of my fears for the future is that despite us having the most mediums ever available to put ourselves out there and become a testimony for human life, we are becoming dislocated from the joints of community and isolated from society. And instead, history becomes the version of events put forward by an authority who commandeers the narrative and twists it for their own purpose, to maximize and exert control over others.
We are losing ourselves, and history is written by the victor.
"You'll own nothing, and you'll be enslaved."
Is that the story we are passing to the next generation?
Taraz
[ Gen1: Hive ]
